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Context: House Hansard - 99 - Sep/21/22

May/10/23 2:09:09 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, jurors play an integral role in our justice system, often at a considerable personal cost, from being away from family and work to suffering from mental health issues after a difficult trial. Nothing can fully prepare someone for jury service. Earlier this year, a bill that I championed to better support juror mental health became law, but there is still lots of work to do. The federal government has a key leadership role in working with the provinces and territories to bolster juror supports, and there needs to be greater public awareness. That is why I fully support Bill S-252 to dedicate the second week of May as national jury duty appreciation week. I want to thank all jurors for their important contributions to Canada's justice system.

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Sep/21/22 6:16:43 p.m.
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Re: Bill S-206

Madam Speaker, I rise to speak for what I trust will be the last time on Bill S-206, legislation to support juror mental health. The idea of this bill came about as a result of a study at the justice committee on juror support, the first of its kind. It was initiated by the member for Cowichan—Malahat—Langford. I am very proud to say that the member has been a seconder of this bill and a champion of it. Five years ago, former jurors came before the justice committee and told their stories of going through difficult trials and of how their mental health suffered as a result. During the study, we learned that former jurors are uniquely impeded in their ability to get mental health supports as a result of something called the jury secrecy rule. Section 649 of the Criminal Code actually makes it a criminal offence for a former juror to disclose any aspect of the deliberation process with anyone for life, even a medical professional. From a mental health standpoint, how can one get better? How can one get the help they need if they are unable to talk about what is often the most difficult aspect of jury service, the deliberation process? However, there is a solution to this challenge. That solution is to carve out a narrow exception to the rule so that former jurors can confide with a medical professional about all aspects of jury service bound by confidentiality. It was a key recommendation of our unanimous justice committee report. Too often in this place, we undertake studies on important topics, produce reports with valuable recommendations and then those reports proceed to be put on a bookshelf where they collect dust. Having regard for the impactful testimony of the former jurors who graciously came before the justice committee to tell their stories, I did not want to see that happen in this case. That is why I put forward a private member's bill to carve out this exception and make that the law. The bill received unanimous support. Four bills and three Parliaments later, we are on the cusp of seeing this legislation pass into law. From a process standpoint, it highlights the real difficulty in getting a private member's bill across the finish line, even one with unanimous support. There are a number of people I would like to thank, but unfortunately I do not have the time to do so in the time allocated to me. However, I will thank three people: Senator Pierre-Hugues Boisvenu for introducing this bill in the other place and successfully championing it through the other place; Senator Lucie Moncion, herself a former juror who suffered from mental health issues arising from her service and who played an integral role in seeing the passage of this bill in the other place; and Mark Farrant of the Canadian Juries Commission, himself a former juror and one of the former jurors who came before our committee. Mark is a leading champion today of juror mental health supports. Jurors play an integral role in the administration of justice in Canada, often at a considerable personal sacrifice. Jurors deserve to get the help they need when they need it. This bill would help former jurors do just that. After five years, let us get this done. Let us get it passed. Let us make it the law.

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Jun/9/22 5:51:18 p.m.
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Re: Bill S-206

Mr. Speaker, it would be retroactive in the sense that former jurors would be able to disclose all aspects of their jury service with a medical professional even if the trial concluded years ago. One thing I do want to add is that some of the former jurors who did appear before our committee, Mark Farrant and Tina Daenzer, who are here in Ottawa, have done incredible work to support jurors through the Canadian Juries Commission. They have taken an incredible amount of suffering and difficulty and have worked to bring greater awareness around some of the issues facing jurors. They are to be commended for their leadership.

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Jun/9/22 5:49:41 p.m.
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Re: Bill S-206

Mr. Speaker, the member for North Island—Powell River is absolutely right. Jury service is a mandatory form of civic duty. As Mark Farrant notes, it is the last form of mandatory civic duty since the abolition of conscription. The former jurors that we heard from I think reflect most former jurors across Canada. They are proud of their jury service. They also believe that they should not suffer from mental health issues, unable to get help, because they performed their civic duty. Jurors undertake work integral to the administration of justice in Canada at a considerable personal cost. We have to recognize that and we have to do more to support them.

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Jun/9/22 5:47:42 p.m.
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Re: Bill S-206

Mr. Speaker, one of the key recommendations was to see that former jurors who are suffering from mental health issues can access as many counselling sessions as required. Another important component was to see that former jurors have information packages so they have a better idea of what jury service entails, because a big stressor is that of the unknown. Many jurors, until they are summoned, have very little experience with the criminal justice system, what a trial looks like and what impacts a trial could have. That is a very straightforward recommendation that all provinces can work toward offering in the way of information. Another recommendation that I think is key is seeing that there is training, not of jurors, but of judges and other actors in the justice system to recognize and better understand some of the stressors that jurors face and to work to help alleviate those in the course of a trial as a result of that greater awareness.

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Context: House Hansard - 79 - Jun/1/22

Jun/9/22 5:32:39 p.m.
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Re: Bill S-206

moved that the bill be read the third time and passed. He said: Madam Speaker, it is an honour to rise to speak to Bill S-206 at third reading stage. It is an act to amend the Criminal Code relating to section 649, otherwise known as the jury secrecy rule. This bill, which I was proud to sponsor in the House of Commons, is a straightforward piece of legislation that would carve out a narrow exception to the jury secrecy rule. As it currently stands, former jurors are unable to disclose any aspect of their jury service with anyone for life, even a medical professional bound by confidentiality. This bill addresses that by carving out an exception whereby former jurors who are suffering from mental health issues arising from their jury service could disclose all aspects of that service with a medical professional bound by confidentiality. This bill is a needed piece of legislation that would go a long way to supporting juror mental health, and I will get into the substance of that momentarily. I am very pleased that this bill has been reported back to the House from the justice committee unamended and with unanimous support. This bill has already passed the House unanimously at second reading stage. A bill that I introduced in the 42nd Parliament, Bill C-417, a bill that is substantively the same as this bill, passed the House at all legislative stages but did not progress due to the call of the 2019 election. Thanks to the leadership of Senator Pierre-Hugues Boisvenu, who introduced this bill in the Senate, and Senator Lucie Moncion, a former juror who suffered from mental health issues arising from her jury service, we have seen this bill clear the other place, again with unanimous support. I speak to the unanimity around this bill because it really does underscore that this is a common-sense fix. It is not often that we can find unanimous support across the board from all parliamentarians and all stakeholders involved, including former jurors, mental health professionals and lawyers, among others. This bill is a product of the study the justice committee undertook on juror supports, the first parliamentary study of its kind. It was initiated by the member for Cowichan—Malahat—Langford. I had the privilege of serving on the justice committee during the study and continue to serve on that committee. I can tell members that while there are many people I can thank for leading the bill to where it is today in being on the cusp of passing into law, this bill would not have happened but for the jurors who came before the justice committee. These former jurors came to our committee and talked about the impact the jury service had on them. Jury service is something that I think sometimes we do not know enough about, unless we are summoned to serve on a jury or know someone who has been. Jury service can be stressful. Jurors can be exposed to horrific evidence, and it can have an impact on their mental health. To provide just a bit of context in terms of the experiences of former jurors who conveyed their stories before the justice committee, I want to take a moment to read into the record some of the testimony we heard four and a half years ago. Mark Farrant, a jury foreman in a gruesome murder trial, said: In court as a juror, I took all the evidence in silently, as was my role. As jurors, we ingest the evidence and the facts. We do not interact with it. We are not afforded an opportunity to look away or raise our hands and say to the courtroom, “Turn that off; I've had enough.” Tina Daenzer, who served as juror number one in the gruesome Paul Bernardo trial, said, “Imagine watching young girls being raped and tortured over and over again. You couldn't close your eyes and you couldn't look away because your duty was to watch the evidence.” Patrick Fleming, who served on a jury involving a 10-month gruesome murder trial, spoke about jury service and the impact it had on his life. He said: When my civic duty was done and I was able to go home to my family and return to my “normal” life, I pulled into my driveway and expected feelings of relief to wash over me, but something was different. I did not feel at my place of peace. Something was not right. He went on to say: We need assistance getting back to our “normal” life. We are civilians who did not choose this path for ourselves nor are we trained to deal with this type of situation. Being a juror is a monumental job that has had a major impact on my life. In the course of our study, we heard about the jury secrecy rule and the degree to which it can impede jurors getting the full mental health supports they need. In that regard, there are at least two impediments. The first is that the deliberation process is often the most stressful aspect of jury service. To not be able to talk about what is often the most stressful aspect of jury service is clearly an impediment to getting the help that a juror suffering from mental health issues requires. The second issue, which is more general in nature, is that it can impact the ability of former jurors to have full and frank discussions with mental health and other medical professionals because there is a lack of understanding about what the boundaries are regarding what can be talked about in light of the jury secrecy rule. We even heard that some medical professionals are reluctant to take on former jurors as clients as a result. That is where this bill comes in. It provides clarity in the law and ensures that former jurors can have those full and frank discussions in a strictly confidential context. These full and frank discussions are often so vital to getting better in the face of mental health issues. This legislation is not novel. It may be new to Canada, but it has been successfully implemented in the Australian state of Victoria, where it has worked very well. This issue and the way this bill has moved forward speak to Parliament working at its best. We had a groundbreaking study on juror supports in which an issue was identified regarding jurors getting mental health supports, and a solution was identified. Rather than letting the unanimous report sit on the shelf and collect dust, I took it upon myself to introduce a bill, Bill C-417, a few months after the release of that report. However, at all stages, up until today, I received full support and collaboration from all members on all sides, including the member for Mount Royal, who was the chair of the justice committee during the study, the member for Cowichan—Malahat—Langford and the former member for Victoria, who is the minister of aboriginal affairs today in the Government of British Columbia, among many others, all of whom recognized that this was an issue and that we needed to work together to implement a key common-sense recommendation that is small but will have a meaningful impact. This bill is very close to crossing the finish line, and I hope it will cross the finish line today so that we can send it to the Governor General. It is a step forward, but a lot more work needs to be done around juror mental health. When we think about it, in a criminal trial, the lawyers, the Crown, the defence, the presiding judge and court workers all have access to various mental health programs and supports, but guess who often do not. It is the men and women who do not have a choice to be there. They are there because they have been summoned. They are performing their civic duty, and often they have nothing in the way of mental health support programs. Fortunately, there has been some movement. Four provinces now have juror support programs, but they are not robust enough. In short, jurors in those four provinces have access to up to four counselling sessions free of charge. Often that is about it, and those measures were only implemented in the last number of years. I recognize the member for Ottawa Centre because when he was the minister of justice, he heard Mark Farrant and took it upon himself to see that the Province of Ontario developed a juror support program. However, there is more work to do because in six provinces there are essentially no supports and we need to do better. What I hope is that after we pass this bill, the government will take seriously the implementation of another key recommendation of the report on juror supports: to work with the provinces to address the patchwork in the lack of supports and the inadequacy of supports, and provide, among other things, one-time funding so that we can have the supports that jurors deserve. Jurors play an integral role in the administration of justice. We owe this to them. They should not have to suffer from mental health issues, unable to get help. This bill is a step in the direction of helping former jurors. I say very simply that it is a bill that has been studied and debated exhaustively. We all know the issue and we know what needs to be done. Let us get this bill passed and sent to the Governor General today to be brought into law.

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Context: House Hansard - 70 - May/12/22

Jun/1/22 2:17:17 p.m.
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Re: Bill S-206

Mr. Speaker, jury service often comes at a considerable sacrifice. Many jurors go through difficult trials and are exposed to horrific evidence, yet they are unable to talk about what is often the most stressful aspect of jury service, the deliberation process, due to the jury secrecy rule. Yesterday, the justice committee voted unanimously to send Bill S-206, of which I am the House of Commons sponsor, back to the House for third reading. The bill carves out a narrow exception to the jury secrecy rule so that former jurors can disclose all aspects of their jury service to a medical professional bound by confidentiality so that former jurors can get the help that they deserve. Jurors play an indispensable role in the administration of justice. We owe it to them to see that this bill finally crosses the finish line and is passed into law.

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Context: House Hansard - 70 - May/12/22

May/12/22 5:51:17 p.m.
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Re: Bill S-206

Mr. Speaker, the member for Shefford is absolutely right. There are jurors, and we heard from them at the justice committee. Mark Farrant, who is a leading advocate, suffered from PTSD. His life has forever been changed. Despite the enormous difficulties that he experienced, he is trying to put those challenges to good use to help other jurors so they can get support and they can get help. I do want to underscore one thing. These former jurors are not complaining about jury service. They are proud of having been a juror. They are proud of having performed their civic duty. All they are asking for is that they should not have to do their civic duty at the expense of their mental health.

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